Along the riverbank at Wentworth in southern NSW where the Murray meets the Darling there is a landscaped levee bank which on closer inspection turns out to be a grand illusion that incorporates the houses, trees and power poles behind, but only when you stand in the correct position. Continue reading Take an Optic at This
About 15kms off the Eyre Highway near the town of Minnipa in South Australia, Pildappa Rock stands high and proud above the wheat fields. The Eyre Peninsula is known for its granite monoliths and nearby Mt. Wudinna is 2nd largest to Uluru. Our mate finds a perfect campsite beside the wave face of the Rock and we constantly marvel at its size and the lichen stripes and patterns. Our other fellow campers are sprightly eighty year old retired Clarence Valley farmers in a camper trailer. We climb the rock and watch the sun set over the wheat fields. Our neighbour … Continue reading Pildappa Rock
We’re home again after a three week trip and I decide to bake some biscuits for a picnic that we will be going on. It’s an easy recipe and I soon toss them in the oven to bake for 15 minutes. Will I have a quick shower? No I might get distracted, how about catching up with the newspaper on the couch? Great idea I tell myself and settle in. After 12 minutes I peer through the oven door and little seems to have happened. They certainly aren’t brown and cracked on top like the recipe says. Oh, well just … Continue reading One Advantage of Owning a Caravan That the Salesman Won’t Tell You About
At first glance the houses, or ‘tinnies’ as they are known, of Broken Hill, NSW appear to be small, tired, unkempt corrugated iron shacks. But on closer inspection no two are the same, most are very neat, although few have gardens as we coastal dwellers know them. There is a lack of water in this town, so those who want a garden, have invested in succulents and oleanders. There must be a termite problem because the power poles are concrete and iron like those in Adelaide. This would explain the use of corrugated iron for the houses. Some houses have … Continue reading Broken Hill ‘Tinnies’
We intend to spend the night at the Sebastian Recreation Reserve so we take the Marong Bypass to avoid Bendigo. It is still raining, steady soaking rain. Gabbi Garmin decides to send us down a shortcut and before we know it we are sliding along on a stretch of very wet clay road, hanging on and hoping that our new four wheel drive does what it is meant to do. By the time we reach Sebastian we look like we’ve been to the outback with red mud from top to tail. Needless to say Gabbi gets told once again. Sebastian … Continue reading Sebastian, Vic
We had hoped to get into El Questro and the staff had informed me that our van would have no trouble at all and that he road in was great. We take the iconic Gibb River Road which is sealed at this end and cruise on down to the turn off. It is a wide gravelled road but within minutes we realise that it is a no go for Priscilla. We shudder our way through five kilometres before we can find a spot wide enough to turn around then shudder back to the bitumen cursing bad roads for the second … Continue reading Oh dear, not again
We unhook Priscilla at the Bungle Bungles Caravan Park (Mabel Downs Station) and take off down the track to the Purnululu National Park. Fifty three kilometres of bone jarring corrugations, twists, turns and blind rises. Not to mention the five or six creek crossings although I do notice Woody grinning like a Cheshire Cat with those. When we finally get to the ranger station we learn that there is another 60km return journey just to reach Cathedral Gorge. Deciding to err in favour of caution we choose to visit the nearby lookout before skedaddling back to camp. The view is … Continue reading Boy did we bungle that
This morning we had doubts about towing the van up the steep road to Vlamingh Head lighthouse. It turned out to be easier than it looked and well worthwhile. We camp for the night at the Barradale Rest Area which is beside the Yannarie River. It is a well appointed rest area and we are kept entertained watching the road trains as they approach the bridge. The highlight being when one prime mover tows another fully loaded four tray road train across the bridge, now that’s torque. He’d have no trouble getting up to the lighthouse. Our neighbour John and … Continue reading Barradale, WA
Beasley River Rest Area in the Pilbara in Western Australia is well off the road with good facilities and shady trees. We’ve driven for two days without seeing a town. There are red mesas covered in buttons of green spinifex with purple ranges in the distance. Dry creek beds are lined with white ghost gums. Real Australia. We make camp and I bounce over the red dirt to meet a couple from Berlin and extol the virtues of the area. They look at me in shock “Vot zees?” he says. They leave shortly after, obviously he’s looking for the scenery. … Continue reading Beauty is in the Eye of the Beholder
The Katherine museum is a little beaut. We learn about the World War Two bombings, the 1998 twenty metre flood (when even the high level crossing was under water), pastoralists, explorers, the stolen generation and native title. Three things were a stand out to me. 1. The statue of a stockman on his horse at the entrance to town honours all stockmen and is the local legend Sabu Peter Sing part Chinese part Aboriginal. To me that typifies most Australians as we are a mixed bag. 2. The Planetarium built by a man known as ‘Galloping Jack’ who was an … Continue reading Katherine Museum
itchingforhitching 